Cope
by Kurenai0111
Summary: Three persons are left grieving the loss of the most precious ones to them, and each of them copes in their own way. Kofuku is certain that Daikoku will come back to her, Kazuma is crushed by Veena's disappearance, and Hiyori feels like a part of her soul her been ripped off her chest because her god of fortune is gone.


**This happens after the Heaven's arc, if they had not been declared innocent.**

* * *

It had been definitely _unusual_, and slightly scary for the goddess of poverty when she woke up alone. Her shinki's pillow wasn't even next to her; that's when she saw that that she got really worried. Kofuku normally _never_ slept alone. She and Daikoku had been used to sleep together with Daigo for so long that it felt strange not to do it anymore, even if Daigo wasn't there.

She got out of bed with a frown, verifying once again that her shinki wasn't in her room. There was no appetizing smell floating in the air, and no sound of anything cooking. She called her shinki in a trembling and childish voice. "D-Daikoku?"

Silence.

She checked every room in the first floor, without success. No Daikoku or trace of him in sight. She dialled his number too, in vain. Bishamon's and Ebisu's and Yato's all directly went to voicemail.

She couldn't remember what had happened the day before, and couldn't find a possible reason for her shinki's sudden disappearance, but he wouldn't have left before telling her where he was going... He would have left a note or something, if he was really in a hurry. He knew how much she could get worried about him.

Seriously, _where_ could he be?

She had a terrible, terrible feeling in her gut. Like he was definitely _lost_. She wiped her tears, and shook her head. No, not was not the time to cry. It was the time to go find her shinki, and get angry at him to have made her worry that much.

She headed upstairs. Maybe Yukine and Yato could give her more info about where had Daikoku gone. Yukine was pretty close from him, so maybe he knew something. She didn't have any other lead than these two, anyway.

She knocked hesitantly to alert them of her presence. "Um, Yato-chan? Yukki? Do you mind if I enter? I-I have something really important to ask you."

No answer. Definitely getting _enough_ of the silent treatment, she huffed a breath and slammed the door open. "Both of you!"

She let out a whimpering, broken little sound from the bottom of her throat as she unconsciously took a step back.

It was empty too.

Her heart fell in the bottom of her stomach as she started to inspect the room. They weren't here neither. Exactly like Daikoku, there was no trace of Yato or Yukine in this room, no trace that they had once lived there.

Yato had never been someone to wake up early, that was for sure. It was something both Yukine and Daikoku reproached him often, and the former often woke him up when he thought he had slept too much.

She was scared.

Just to be sure, she dialled the number of everybody she had registered in her phone. No one answered her.

She returned in her bedroom and sat on her bed, hugging her knees to her chest and trying her hardest not to cry. She would wait for her shinki, and for her friends, until they came back. Even if she had to wait forever.

_Daikoku, Yato-chan, Yukki... Come back soon..._

* * *

Sayuri was out of herself with worry. It has been a few days that Hiyori had locked herself in her room, refusing to see anyone and refusing to eat anything. She had first found that strange and unusual, because she knew her daughter. There was no way she would get so upset over something. And if it was really so grave, then she would _at_ _least_ have talked a little bit with her.

She tried calling Ami and Yama, her two closest friends, and they didn't know what was wrong with her either. It had been a few days that she had not come to school, and she hadn't answered to any of their calls. After a promise to let them now when she had more info, she hung up.

She had called Masaomi, too. Although she didn't like to think like that, maybe she had said what was wrong to her brother, and not to her parents. But Masaomi didn't know. He had come when he heard that Hiyori had a problem, and was determined to stay until he found out what it was.

"What could be wrong with her...?" asked the father to no one in particular.

"I don't know," said honestly her brother, looking at her closed door. "She wouldn't get upset over something small, I know her. When did she begin to get like this?"

"A few days ago," sighed the father. "When she came home, she was late, and wounded. We asked her what was wrong, but she didn't answer us and walked past us and locked herself up. No matter what we say, she doesn't react."

"Wh-What if the reason she doesn't answer is that... s-she isn't alive anymore...?" asked the mother, going pale at the thought. She had often seen the dark look in her daughter's eyes; it was a look that never lasted long. It was almost always replaced by the look of the dead. "What if my girl... M-My Hiyori, she..." Tears fell freely from her cheeks as she hurled her body against the door, desperate to open it. Both her husband and her son grabbed her arms. "_Sayuri_!"

"Mother, _stop_! You're going to hurt yourself!"

"_Hiyori_!" She never stopped trying to struggle free. She would give everything on earth so that damned door opened. So that she could see her adorable and precious daughter full of life again. "_Hiyori_!_ Hiyori_! **Hiyori**!"

Huddled in a corner of her room, Hiyori wept harder, clutching a framed photograph in her hands. She thought didn't have any tears left anymore, but they still came easily when she thought about the ones she had lost that day.

_Yato... Yukine-kun..._

She didn't know when she would leave her room. Maybe she would stay here forever.

It didn't matter much to her anyway.

* * *

Kazuma was inconsolable, and the mansion was chaos without their goddess to lead them.

Kazuma felt tears coming to his eyes by simply seeing the mark on the back of his hand. That mark binding him to his master.

He had never hated so much being her exemplar. He was supposed to protect her, to be _there_ for her. Not only he had let her be in danger, but now she was...

That was what made the disappointment and confusion on Bishamon's shinki's faces when he came home even more painful, the "Where did Ane-sama go?" even sadder, the critics about how he had failed in his task even harsher. It was suffocating him. He couldn't breathe under all that guilt.

When Kazuha and Karuha had started to cry though, he snapped. He had yelled that she would _never_ come back before locking himself in his quarters, where he had cried for the rest of the day. He didn't know what to do without his goddess, without the one he loved.

He was supposed to show her the way, but he was completely lost.

* * *

_Hiyori felt her consciousness quit her body, little by little. Not like when her soul would slip out of her body, but like her _life_ was slipping out of her body. She thought that it wasn't that bad. She could be with them again, that way._

_Kazuma never got better. He spent all his days crying over Bishamon, refusing comfort or even people talking to him. He didn't know what the Ha clan was going to become. All because of his mistakes, he had condemned them all. He wished he would be the first one to turn into an Ayakashi, so that the pain would end soon._

_Kofuku refused to move, even when Tenjin, who was visiting her after too many days of silence, had explained what had happened to her shinki. She had yelled that it was all a _**lie**, _that Daikoku would never have left her without saying anything, and that she would wait until he came home. She knew she was a goddess of bad things, but it wasn't her fault, was it? It wasn't because she was a binbougami that she had to lose her only shinki, all that she had left, right? She shook her head. He would come home. _

The same thought crossed their minds after some time. A thought that they refused to acknowledge, yet that was the truth. A truth that would change all of them, forever.

...

...

...

_You won't come back, will you?_


End file.
